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An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. "A fight is going on inside me," he said to the boy.

"It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil—he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego." He continued, "The other is good—he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you—and inside every other person, too."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, "Which wolf will win?"

Saturday, May 21, 2011

Probably not, because the media never mentions it; because our state and local governments do not know about it; and because we are so busy trying to be someplace else rather than exploring what we have and who we are. In the northwest corner of Prince George's County lies the 100 year old, premier agricultural research facility in the world. If it has to do with food, fuel, fiber, forests, feed, or flowers BARC is working on it hidden in plain sight. From turkeys to strawberries, obesity to animal genetics, human nutrition to infant inoculation, insect repellents to organic plastics, the long reach of BARC is here in our county unknown to most of us. The cows leaning against the fence on Powder Mill Rd are not lean beef but tomorrow's answer to food for the world. One of the many of research labs is the USDA ARS Crop Systems And Global Change Lab at BARC (Beltsville Agricultural Research Center) focuses on "developing crop simulation models for on-farm decision support and assessment of global climate change effects on crop yields and soil quality." Theyt also carry out world class, cutting edge" research to better understand the mechanisms controlling response and adaptation to carbon dioxide, light, water, temperature and soil chemistry." In other words, Prince George's County, Maryland, proudly hosts a world center of climate change research of the first rank right in its collective backyards - in the case of College Park, Greenbelt and Beltsville quite literally in the backyard or perhaps better put, the front yard. Much of the research is carried out in "both indoor and outdoor growth chambers, greenhouses and field plots." And why should you care? Changes in climate for whatever reason directly affect food crops from corn to milk, from eggs to blueberries, from bread to apples. If you eat it, climate impacts how much there is, where it grows and the final price paid in the grocery store. The work of BARC is the national effort to keep food available and affordable. Understanding changes in climate helps farmers stay ahead of problems enabling them to keep food reaching our tables. In addition changes in climate affect how weeds that reduce harvests grow and how we react to changes in plant toxicity and even how plants and our allergies may interact. The work of BARC tells farmers what to grow, where to grow it, and when to grow it so that the shelves in market places do not go empty. Did you know that Dr. Lewis Ziska's study of plants and pollen in test plots and carbon dioxide chambers was the first continental-scale measurement of the effects of climate warming on ragweed plants? The Crop Systems and Global Change Lab (CSGCL), headed up by Dr. Vangimalla Reddy, "applies systems theory to the solution of complex agricultural problems and to the development of computer-aided farm decision support systems and assessment tools for environmental study and analysis. This Lab undertakes research to analyze and design systems, to develop models and expert systems, and to generate and evaluate data bases. It carries out research to improve the growth, yield and quality of crops in the face of climatic changes, through increased understanding of mechanisms controlling response and adaptation to CO2, light, water, temperature, and soil chemistry. Studies are undertaken at molecular, biochemical, organismic, and community levels in controlled environments, greenhouses and in the field, exploiting natural and induced genetic variability and emphasizing interactions among environmental variables. CSGCL carries out basic and applied research to improve methods of managing agriculturally important crops."

The next time someone asks why anyone would live here, point out the exciting work that leads the world into the 21st century and ask what their county is doing to better science and understanding?

Sunday, May 15, 2011

I have had strawberries from my Extra early variety in the Washington market just three weeks ago this day. The Boston Pine and Hovey's Seedling were both pulled from under precisely the same circumstances ten days later. For the first, I obtained $1 50, and $2 per quart, and this was repeated three successive market' days. This variety requires & south exposure, and a light gravelly soil. It is certainly the earliest variety I have ever been able to procure, and I assure you I have spared no pains or expense in endeavoring to obtain the earnest, as it is quite a desideratum here with us. Many persons have entirely failed, even in this climate, with my early. On flat, .rich, and adhesive soils, it is not worth cultivating; but, on a congenial soil, it is most valuable and profitable with me. It is a pretty good bearer, and the fruit attains a medium size. I find it a good fructifier for the Hovey's Seedling when planted in its proximity. I think the plan ofmixing the slaminate and pistillate plants is entirely unnecessary, as I can prove by ocular demonstration. It is only necessary for them to approach each other in the same patch. I have beds of Hovey's Seedling in profuse bearing, the remote parts of which are not nearer than 150 feet of any staminate plants..

The Boston Pine in some situations with me this season is bearing most abundantly, and, where they have sufficient room, they are literally covered with trusses of magnificent fruit.. Sonle plants, I have no hesitation to discard.

My crop of Hovey's Seedling surpasses any thing I ever had any conception of. I can how pick from three to four hundred quarts per day, and my patches' are comparatively small. The demand here is limited, and will not justify a very extensive cultivation.

I have now been cultivating the strawberry for twenty years, and have spent somoe hundreds of dollars in procuring all the finest varieties as they were announced. 1 have now come to the conclusion that some four or five are all that are necessary for any purpose. I have thrown out at least fifty varieties which have been extolled in their day. Hovey's Seedling I consider incomparably superior to any and all others I have ever tried, or ever expect to try. It combines every essential to render it desirable-. It is fine in flavor, magnificent in size, of beautiful color, and extraordinarily productive. It ia the very ne plus ultra of all the varieties of this delicious fruit: In haste, with great respect, yours,&c.

Located across Oxon Hill Road from the Oxon Hill Manor, slightly to the north of the present Manor entrance is the plantation home Salubria. Salubria was the home of the Bayne, Addison, Breckinridge, and Castle families, and had been occupied by members of these families from the early 1800's until 1989. The Bayne family arrived in America on the Ark in 1634. In Out of the past, Prince Georgians and Their Land 1-, by R. Lee Van Horn, many references were made to the ancestors of the Dr. Bayne who built Salubria.

In 1695, a John Bayne was a delegate to the General Assembly in Annapolis from Charles County. A later John Bayne was appointed postmaster in 1761 and 1766. This John Bayne was also awarded a contract to build a bridge over the lower Piscataway Creek in 1762. In 1776 references were made to a Captain Samuel Hawkins Bayne and a Lieutenant William Bayne in connection with their orders for the Revolutionary War. The main hall at St. John's Church is called Bayne Hall. The plantation home was built in 1827 by John H. Bayne, an 1825 graduate of the University of Maryland Medical School.

At the time of Dr. Bayne's marriage to Mary Frances McDaniel, his father deeded 64 acres of his land to him across the road from Oxon Hill Manor. Ellsworth Bayne had purchased 328 acres of Oxon Hill Manor from Reverend Walter Dulaney Addison in 1811 . Because Dr. John Bayne maintained his office in the south wing of the home, he called the plantation Salubria, which is from the word salubrious, meaning healthful. After the death of his first wife, Dr. Bayne married Harriet Addison in 1841. She was the daughter of John Addison of Cole Brook.

Tragedy struck the Bayne family in the 1830,s when Dr. Bayne's two sons, George and John, seven and five years of age, were poisoned by their young slave nursemaid, fourteen year old Juda (Judith). She also confessed to setting fire to Salubria in 1833 and the year before had poisoned the doctor's baby daughter, Catherine. She was tried and hanged in Upper Marlborough, thereby earning the dubious distinction of being the youngest female ever executed in American legal history. Dr. Bayne was not only a prominent doctor, but an active participant in horticulture and politics. He farmed his own land and his father's lands and is credited with taking the tomato out of the garden curiosity class and making it a field crop.

He was also a close associate of Charles B. Calvert of Riverdale, and assisted him in the planning of the College of Agriculture at the University of Maryland. President Lincoln gave Dr. Bayne a commission as a high-ranking surgeon in the Union Army during the Civil War.

Three successive generations of the Bayne family were physicians. These three Baynes earned the highest esteem of their patients, many of whom were prominent in their day. Dr. J. Breckinridge Bayne received the highest award of Rumania from Queen Marie for his work in her country during the First World War.

Salubria is a long frame house, painted white, with graceful two story porch columns. It is considered a good example of southern architecture of the antebellum period. The property is also noted for its particularly fine specimens of boxwood and holly. The boxwood from Salubria was used to establish the shrub in the plantings at the present Oxon Hill Manor. Two large stone tablets presented to the family by the Queen of Rumania are still on the front veranda.

Salubria was in good condition until the late 1970's. It caught fire in 1981 and is no longer occupied. The house and surrounding property were offered for sale and the family had hoped it would be purchased and restored by M-NCPPC. But in September of 1989, Ronald Cohan Investments announced development plans that included an office park and hotel north of historic Salubria.

Cohen's plans included rebuilding the old house for use as a restaurant and/or small convention center. Phase I, the five story Salubria Office Park is evident at the intersection of Indian Head Highway and Oxon Hill Road directly across from the proposed Port America site.

Saturday, May 14, 2011

Thirty years since, "Horticulture" was a prominent feature in the title of the paper commenced in Baltimore, by the senior Editor of the Plough, the Loom, and the Anvil, under every discouragement, for the advancement of all branches of rural industry. From that day to this, we have never ceased to apply every incitement we could think of, in the way of argument and example, of denunciation and praise, to shame the negligent and to encourage those who are attentive to the cultivation of fruits and vegetables.

If we had our way, in doing what we believe would best promote the true welfare of society, we would have Congress vote a gold medal, or a pension, sooner to the man who, like Doctor Bayne, leads the way in horticulture, in the midst of a country neglectful of that elegant, innocent, and useful art, than to reward in that way the slayer often thousand guerillas. And were we President of the United States, so help us Heaven! we would feel bound to select such a man, for such a service to his fellow-men, for the governorship of a province, sooner than we would one who could say in a public despatch (we care not what may be his party politics) that "the most beautiful scene he had ever beheld was when, by moonlight, he could see and hear the crash of the houses in the thickest settled part of a Mexican town, falling under the force of his well-directed cannon-balls," destroying doubtless the lives of hundreds of women and children.

But in all the examples we have seen to excite the proprietor of land to a closer attention to horticulture, here are strung together the greatest number of remarkable instances of the profit of fruit culture: for it seems, after all, that if men are to be moved you must touch them in the "pocket nerve." Much more beautiful, however, is it to see a gentleman or lady prompted to the care of fruit and flowers, under the refining inspiration of a love of such pursuits, for their innocence and their amusing nature, and for the enjoyments they afford them the means of imparting to their family and friends. Who believes, for instance, that when Wilder is watching the budding and the fruiting of a new pear, or the blowing of a new japonica; or Mrs. George Law, of Baltimore, is busy among her vines, or in her green-house, and beautiful shrubbery; that their pure delights are contaminated by sordid calculations of pecuniary interest ? For the mass of mankind, however, it is true there is not so much—though with all there is some—time and means that may be given con amore to such objects. With those, then, who are compelled by necessity, or led by a coarser nature, to heed only such occupation of time as will tend to fill the purse, the following may have its weight.

We may add a case of a single vine of the Isabella grape, growing in the rear of the office we lately occupied, which, spreading over a surface of some twenty-five feet by ten, bore six hundred bunches of fine grapes—enough to give to the family table twenty bunches a day for thirty days! Yet how many—nay, how few, there are of farmers on a scale of 500 acres or more, who have it in them to provide a single bunch of grapes, or an apricot, or even a really good apple or pear in the whole year!

The Plough, the Loom, and the Anvil, Volume 1. 1848. J.S. Skinner & Son

The production of this delicious and healthy fruit is so easy, and where grown for sale, so profitable, that it is surprising it is not found in every farmer's garden, where a small space devoted to it would ensure a supply of fruit for a long time. Any soil suitable for other vegetables, will produce strawberries, but the best soil is a deep friable loam. The best time for transplanting is in the autumn after the vines have ceased bearing, but they will succeed if planted early in the spring. Dr. Bayne, in that excellent Journal, " Hovey's Magazine of Horticulture," gives the following directions for the culture of this fruit, which can scarcely fail of success; though we may add, that if the soil is suitable, and the plants arc kept clear of weeds, and the runners stopped, there will usually be little doubt about the bearing, whatever may be the mode or distance of planting."

" For the reception of the plants select a loamy or sandy soil i spade in a thick layer of strong unfermented manure, and thoroughly pulverize the earth; mark off the ground in rows three feet asunder, then select the strongest plants, and set them 12 inches from plant to plant in the rows. Permit the runners to lake possession of every alternate space; observing to eradicate weeds and grass throughout the season. The runners from the other space must be carefully destroyed throughout this time. By this arrangement of the plants, you will have your patch in beds three feet wide, leaving a vacant space or alley three feet wide for the gatherers to walk in. After the fruit season is over, the alleys or spaces unoccupied by the plants, may now be thoroughly worked for the reception of bearing plants for the next year. The plants of the previous year must be spaded under, taking care to leave sufficient plants in the original rows, for the production of bearing vines for the next crop. By this simple mode of reversing the beds, a patch upon the same ground may be continued productive for many years."

In speaking of the finest and most productive varieties, Dr. Bayne adds:—" I would recommend Hovey's Seedling, Female Hudson Bay, Large Lima, Bishop's Orange, Bayne's Prolific, as being splendid varieties, and abundantly prolific. I believe every flower on the above varieties are female, anil if planted separately, will fail to field abundantly; but if planted in proximity with the Melon, or Southborough Seedling, every flower will be impregnated, and will produce enormous crops."

On the sexual difference of the flowers of the strawberry, first brought into notice by Mr. Longworth of Ohio, and received with much favor, as accounting for the fertile and sterile beds of this plant; the conductor of the Magazine dissents from the believers in such sexual difference, and in some comments on the paper of Dr. Bayne, states his opinions at large. We leave room for only the following extracts; and the remark, that in planting strawberry beds, the intermixture of what arc called male and female flowers, can do no no hurt, and will ensure fertility.

" That there may be fertile and sterile beds is not denied; but the cause of their sterile character is to be sought, not in a naturally defective organization of the blossom, but rather in the mode of cultivation applied to the plants. It is well known that all flowers have a tendency to become double, and when this takes place, it is also known that the stamens are transformed into petals. Now somewhat such a change undoubtedly takes place in the strawberry, when under a high state of cultivation, or forced by loo much nourishment to extend its runners too far. Repletion is fatal to the perfection of the blossom, though it may produce apparently a vigorous growth. • • • • Such has been the management of many beds of our seedling. We know of repeated instances where the beds of last year, owing to their entire unproductiveness, were given up as unworthy of any care, which the past season, produced immense crops, though overrun with weeds, and this, too, without being in the vicinity of any other kind. Many such experiments have proved conclusively, that cultivation alone creates fertile or sterile plants."

We think Mr. Hovey has stated the case rather too strongly. Cultivation no doubt does much, but we cannot think does everything. We have had in a small meadow devoted to fruit, and which until last year has not been plowed for a long time, two patches of the common field strawberry, both of which blossomed freely every year, but while one of them always bore freely, the other never produced a solitary berry. In this case there was no mixture of the flowers, and all were sterile; while the patch of mixed blossoms was productive. The cultivation with both patches was precisely the same; and therefore this result must be attributed to some other cause.

The Cultivator: a monthly publication, devoted to agriculture, Volume 1. New York State Agricultural Society. L. Tucker, 1844

House built circa 1830—The house at Salubria was a 2½-story frame dwelling with kitchen wing and doctor's office; on the grounds stood several early nineteenth-century outbuildings. Salubria was built for Dr. John H. Bayne, prominent physician, agriculturist, and first superintendent of the county's public schools; it was the home of five generations of the Bayne family. The house was severely damaged by a series of fires in the 1980s and 1990s. After archeological investigations were undertaken on the rounds, the house and all but one outbuilding were demolished in 2003.

Fort Foote is situated immediately upon the Potomac Hivrr, on the Maryland side, about eight miles below Washington City, on an elevation of land known us llozer's Bluff, at an altitude of about 100 feet above tide-water. In the rear of the fort is an extensive gorge, varying in depth from 10 to 100 feet, running the full extent of the reservation, and continuing thence to the Potomac River. A marsh about 400 yards wide, and covered with a thick growth of coarse grass and small trees, extends along the margin of the Potomac, in a northerly direction, to the distance of a mile. About a mile and a quarter below the post, in a southeasterly direction, is located a marshy tract of land of at least 200 acres, called "Broad Creek;" one-half of its area is clothed with a luxuriant growth of tall coarse grasses, interspersed with scrubby trees and bushes; the other half is composed of mud banks, the accumulation of years, brought down by floods from the hills and valleys above.

This post was established in 1862, as an adjunct to Fort Washington, four miles distant, and

was first occupied by the Ninth New York volunteers, under command of Colonel Stewart.

The fortification is constructed of earth and green timber. The quarters of the garrison, the hospital, and other buildings in process of erection, are eligibly located upon the height back of the fort. The barrack is a new two-story wooden building, 160 feet in length, affording a sufficient capacity for two companies. The walls of the building are lined with brick, and a veranda extends its whole length in front, with a roof formed by a continuation of the roof of the building. The barrack is warmed by stoves, artificially lighted by candles, and ventilated through the roof. The dormitories, 78 by 23 feet, and 9 feet high to the caves, would each accommodate 33 men were each man allowed an air space of 600 cubic feet, but double that number have been placed in them. They are two in number, and occupy the second floor of the building. Iron bedsteads, similar to those used in the hospital department, are furnished, and over each is a shelf for the knapsack of the soldier.

The lower floor of the building contains a wash-room, mess room, kitehen, library, office, &c. The kitchen is large, and has two store-rooms adjoining. The mess-room occupies about one-third of the area of the first floor, and contains two rows of tables.

Married soldiers' quarters are five new rooms, 16 by 12 feet, one room to each family, with a porch in front, and kitchen attached to the rear of the building. Officers' quarters are two frame houses, lined with brick ; each house is a double set of quarters, each set containing four rooms.

A bomb-proof within the fort is occupied as a guard-house and prison-room ; being an earth-work, and the timbers somewhat decayed, it is illy adapted for the purposes for which it is used. It is sufficiently heated by a wood-stove, but the ceilings, which are of decayed logs, admit water in rainy weather. The floor is damp, making it very uncomfortable for the occupants. The guard, house and prison-room are doubtless causes of much sickness at this post, as nearly every private soldier in the garrison has to occupy one of these rooms underground every alternate night on guard duty.

The post bake-house is a commodious wooden building, with brick oven attached sufficiently large to turn out 350 rations of bread in a batch. The water supply is obtained from a well, a spring, and several small cisterns. There are no underdrains or sewers at the post. A system of leveling, grading, paving, and draining has been so thoroughly and unremittingly pursued that the grounds have been rendered comparatively firm and dry.

Endemic dysentery and diarrhosa have prevailed at Fort Foote with great severity during the last six months, (ending December 31, 1869,) which, superadded to the autumnal disease incident to this locality, rendered the percentage of sick very large in proportion to the command, and as tlie first two named diseases have been exclusively continue! to its limits, it is difficult to account

prevail at this post during the autumnal months ; but for the period above mentioned the proportion of sickness has been far greater than that of previous seasons, while Fort Washington, a few miles below, on the Potomac River, with malarial surroundings very similar, has enjoyed the most perfect immunity from disease. The morbific, agent would thus appear to have a local origin, even within the limits of the post; but after the most careful investigation it is impossible to arrive at any satisfactory solution of the, difficulty. The cases have nearly all been very protracted, varying in duration from one to four months, and presenting nearly the same series of morbid phenomena.

The post and hospital gardens contain about three acres. Potatoes, onions, and cabbages are raised in abundance for the supply of the small company at present forming the garrison.

Saturday, May 07, 2011

In some sense the story of John Bayne of Salubria - physician and horticulturist, slaveholder and abolitionist, Senator and citizen - is the story of the unwilling partnership that built Prince George's County, Maryland. Farmer and politician, natural philosopher and citizen scientist, a slaveholder whose support of that evil and peculiar institution came to affect him personally and tragically as it affected the slave which he owned. His story is that of a tortured route to support the abolition of slavery which had benefited him and a privileged minority in the State of Maryland.

The industry of Prince George's County in the early 19th century was overwhelmingly agricultural providing great wealth that came "from the land, tobacco, and from slaves." Indeed, "more slaves worked here than in any other county in the state, and the gentry, the old families who led our social and public life, lived in a style beﬁtting the legends that linger about them." Moreover, the plantation economy of Prince George's County was at its height. By 1860 the county was producing more than thirteen million pounds of tobacco annually. In addition to tobacco, the area produced more than 300,000 bushels of wheat and about 700,000 bushels of corn, and local farmers owned 5,000 horses, 4,000 milk cows, 9,000 sheep, and 25,000 swine. Much of the farm work was done by slaves; among the 2,000 white families in the county, there were 850 slaveholders holding 12,500 slaves.

An 1848 report of an agricultural society's visit to Salubria describes Dr. John H. Bayne, as "the ne plus ultra of horticulturists. The committee spoke of the "wondrous delight upon his variety of fruits. But when they came to taste his delicious Elsinburg grapes, Gloria Mundi, Bell flower, French pippin, Newton Pippin, Holland do., Fall do., Roxbury Russett, English do., Pennock's winter Golden pippin, Redstreak, Siberian crab, Baldwin Winesap and winter Catlin apples, peaches, lemons, &etc, they unanimously agreed, that to Doctor Bayne must be awarded the premium for the best variety of fruit. The committee award to this gentleman another premium of five dollars for his pears and flowers, the only ones exhibited." Pauline Collin writes that "Dr. Bayne was not only a prominent doctor, but an active participant in horticulture and politics. He farmed his own land and his father's lands and is credited with taking the tomato out of the garden curiosity class and making it a field crop." He was also a close associate of Charles B. Calvert of Riverdale, and assisted him in the planning of the College of Agriculture at the University of Maryland and a friend of Thomas G. Clemson (of Clemson University fame)."

Dr. John Bayne was born on February 15, 1804 in Maryland. An influential slaveholder of Prince George's County during the nineteenth century, he was a physician and served as a state senator during the Civil War (1861 – 1865). One of most consistent roles Bayne played was to advocate for all Maryland slaveholders who witnessed their property literally walk away during the chaos of the conflict. As other slave holders also lived in his neighborhood—in particular, Thomas E. Berry at Oxon Hill Plantation—cross-plantation communities among the slaves developed. These connections were important in flight attempts, for blacks from neighboring plantations often ran together. Indeed, when Bayne's slave Sam Tyler fled Salubria in December 1840, his owner suspected that he had run off with one of Berry's Oxon Hill slaves, a man named Jacob Shaw. President Lincoln gave Dr. Bayne a commission as a high-ranking surgeon in the Union Army during the Civil War. Bayne frequently consulted the White House and Maryland's Governor to deal with the problem. In the end, however, neither Senator Bayne, nor his fellow slaveholders could stop self-emancipation efforts of enslaved Marylanders. By 1864, John Bayne foresaw the inevitable end of slavery and wrote a declension speaking out against slavery in favor of a unified nation. Partially in recognition of this, Maryland lawmakers finally abolished slavery in the state with the Constitution of 1864. John Bayne was the owner of the Salubria Plantation in Southern Prince George's County, Maryland. Bayne owned a number of slaves and witnessed resistance on his plantation through destruction of property, harm to his family, and slaves running away. On November 6, 1834 a fourteen-year-old slave named Judith, poisoned Bayne's two sons, George (7 years old) and John (5 years old), who died days later. Judith was interrogated and confessed to the crime. She further admitted attempting to burn the dwelling house at Salubria and killing Bayne's infant daughter Mary Catherine two years prior. According to newspapers of the time, no one understood Judith's motives at the time because "she came from a nice family." Although Judith was only 14 at the time, she was tried and hanged. The children of Dr. Bayne and his wife Mary are buried in the Apple Grove Cemetery in Fort Washington. John Bayne died on August 18, 1870 and is buried at the St. Barnabas Episcopal Church Cemetery in Temple Hills, MD.